Nowell helps England to victory

By Mark Stevens
11/2/17

Jack Nowell got the better of his Exeter Chiefs team-mate Tomas Francis as England came from behind to defeat Wales 21-16 in their latest RBS Six Nations encounter in Cardiff.

With time fast running out for Eddie Jones’ side, it was Wasps winger Elliot Daly who broke Welsh hearts, latching onto a pass from Owen Farrell to claim the match-winning score, which stretched England’s unbeaten run to 16 matches.

Earlier, Liam Williams’ slicing first half try and 11 points from the boot of full-back Leigh Halfpenny looked to have sealed a merited home triumph at the Principality Stadium.

However, England - under the stewardship of Jones - never know when they are beaten and having been kept in touch by the boot of Farrell and a first half try from Ben Youngs, they produced the necessary finish to put them top of the pile and on course to repeat last year’s Grand Slam efforts.

Post-match, Jones (pictured) said: “We have used up all our get-out-of-jail free cards now, but that was just a great Test match and a lot of credit has to go to Wales. That is the best I have seen them play. Their defence was superb – they hit us hard and often, and that was one of the things that made this so memorable. And they kept the ball for long periods, and made it tough for us to get it off them.

“There were some great things to take away for us – starting with the way we played in the first 20 and the last 20. We were terrific early on and in the final quarter we showed outstanding composure to win a great game of rugby. The second thing in our favour was our grit. We have become a team that is really hard to beat. We have gritty characters who don’t know how to accept defeat.

“I think the players believe we can be the best team in the world and if you want to be the best, you’ve got to win those games where you’re not absolutely at your best and you’re against an opposition that’s playing well. And we did that.”

Both Nowell and Francis started the game in the Welsh capital, but both were replaced during the second half by Jonny May and Samson Lee respectively.

Elsewhere, Chiefs club-mate Michele Campagnaro (pictured) again came off the bench for Italy as they were thumped 63-10 by Ireland in Rome.

Keen to bounce back from their opening weekend loss to Scotland, the Irish dominated from start to finish, eventually running in nine tries, all of which were converted by fly-half Paddy Jackson

CJ Stander and Craig Gilroy both grabbed hat-tricks, while Keith Earls (2) and Garry Ringrose completed the scoring for Joe Schmidt’s side.

In reply, Italy grabbed a penalty try, which was converted by fly-half Carlo Canna, who also landed a penalty.